Savings and Investment Account
Savings Account: I start this when the average student has an account balance of around 3000 or more. Every student with this amount may choose to participate. Students open an account that has two significant restrictions. First they must not spent any credits except for those necessary for daily activities, such as bathroom use, penalties and so on. They cannot participate in the lottery or auctions, and can only SELL during marketplace. Second, if they do spend that closes their account and they are accessed a 1000 credits early termination fee. If they abide by the rules, they earn 500 credits the first week in interest. The second week they earn 1000 credits, the third 2000, and the fourth 4000 credits. At this time, they may either opt out or roll the account over for an additional 4 weeks. I do not allow students to open new accounts except for at the very first opportunity, and at that time it is optional. The reasons for this is to alleviate the severe pain in the butt of keeping track and to teach students to seize opportunities as they present themselves. The earnings for the second set of 4 weeks is as follows: week 5 earns 5000, week 6 earns 10,000, week 7 earns 20,000, and week 8 earns 50,000 credits. These amounts can be adjusted to become more in line with the actual economy; for example, if the economy grows more quickly during this time, it would be prudent to raise these amounts because the lesson is to teach the advantages of saving money as well as financial discipline and responsibility. This will create a few VERY wealthy students and many envious ones.
Investment Account: This occurs a few weeks after the close of the 8 week savings accounts. I create the company: Hooper Widget Company. Each student is given 1 share of HWC stock worth 25 credits. Once a week, students are allowed to buy between 0 and 5 shares of stock at the price for that week. They subtract the amount paid from their ledgers. I then roll 2 six sided dice. The results are thus: 7 and 11 cause the price of the stock to drop ½. For example, the 25 credit a share price would drop to 12 credits. All other numbers that are not doubles double the share price i.e., 25 credits per share becomes 50. All doubles that are not 2 or 12 double the share price twice i.e., 25 credits per share becomes 100. Snake eyes (2) and boxcars (12) double the share price three times i.e., 25 credits per share becomes 200. Before the dice are rolled and the new share price is recorded, the students are given the option to sell or keep. If they sell, they add the value of their portfolio to their ledger and their investment account closes. They cannot rejoin the game after this. If they keep their shares, they add nothing to their ledgers and have the option to buy, sell, or stay again the following week. I usually shut this down (by adding the portfolio values to the remaining participant’s ledgers) when either there are no more participants, or the value of the portfolios will be too astronomical for another round. I had a student who had a 7.5 million credit portfolio (with a beginning value of 25) after about 10 or 15 weeks. That round however, the price never dropped because 7 or 11 never came up on the dice. Still, there were only 5 or 6 students who prospered significantly from the game, but they did significantly prosper.